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Why Lindsay Graham’s ‘State Flexibility’ In Health Care Is Hypocritical

Lindsey Graham

Moderates want other senators to respect their states’ decisions on Medicaid expansion, but want to dictate to other senators how those senators’ states should regulate health insurance.

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Shortly after more Republican senators announced their opposition to the current “repeal-and-replace” measure Monday evening, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) took to Twitter to promote his own health-care plan. He claimed that “getting money and power out of Washington and returning it to the states is the best hope for innovative health care,” adding that such moves were an “antidote to 1-SIZE FITS ALL approach embraced in Obamacare.”

There’s just one problem: Graham’s proposal doesn’t get power out of Washington, and it doesn’t fundamentally change the one-size-fits-all Obamacare approach. It also illustrates moderates’ selective use of federalism in the health-care debate, whereby they want other senators to respect their states’ decisions on Medicaid expansion, but want to dictate to other senators how those senators’ states should regulate health insurance.

Pre-Existing Conditions Are the Problem

A summary of Graham’s proposal claims it would block-grant current Obamacare funds to the states, ostensibly giving them flexibility. But the plan comes with a big catch: “The Obamacare requirements covering pre-existing conditions would be retained.”

When it comes to one of Obamacare’s costliest insurance regulations, Washington would still be calling the shots. That significant caveat echoes an existing waiver program under Obamacare, which in essence allows states to act any way they like on health care—so long as they’re implementing the goals of Obamacare. The Graham plan continues that tradition of fraudulent federalism of Washington using states as mere vassals accomplishing objectives it dictates, but perhaps with slightly more flexibility than under Obamacare itself.

This Is Not Repeal

As I have written before, the repeal debate comes down to an inconvenient truth for many Republicans: They can repeal Obamacare, or they can keep the status quo on pre-existing conditions—but they cannot do both. Keeping the requirements on pre-existing conditions necessitates many of the other Obamacare regulations and mandates, which necessitates subsidies (because otherwise coverage would become unaffordable for most Americans), which necessitates tax increases to pay for the subsidies—and you’re left with something approaching Obamacare, regardless of what you call it.

There’s no small amount of irony in moderates’ position on pre-existing conditions. Not only is it fundamentally incongruous with repeal—which most of them voted for only two years ago—but it’s fundamentally inconsistent with their position on Medicaid expansion as well. Why do senators like Lisa Murkowski want to protect their states’ decisions to expand Medicaid, yet dictate to other states how their insurance markets should function, by keeping regulation of health insurance at the federal level?

True Federalism the Solution

If senators—whether Graham, Murkowski, or others—want to promote federalism, then they should actually promote federalism. That means repealing all of the Obamacare mandates driving up premiums, and letting states decide whether they want to have Obamacare, a free-market system, or something else within their borders.

After all, New York did an excellent job running its insurance market into the ground through over-regulation well before Obamacare. It didn’t even need a guide from Washington. If states decide they like the Obamacare regulatory regime, they can easily re-enact it on the state level. But Washington politicians shouldn’t presuppose to arrogate that power to themselves.

In 1947, the McCarran-Ferguson Act codified a key principle of the Tenth Amendment, devolving regulation of health insurance to the states. Barring a few minor intrusions, Washington stayed out of the health insurance business for more than six decades—until Obamacare. It’s time to bring that principle of state regulation back, by repealing the Obamacare insurance regulations and restoring state sovereignty. Graham has the right rhetoric. Now he just needs the policy deeds to match his words.